Abstract

Ninety five cases of salivary gland tumors were reviewed in histopathlogic and clinical aspects. The results were as follows: The average age of patients was 37.9 years. Overall cases showed female predominance with 1.7 : 1 of male to female ratio, but malignant mixed tumors were more frequent 1.3 times in males. The chief complaints were palpable mass (87.3%), pain(14.5%: facial nerve paralysis (9.1%) and swelling(7.3%) in order of frequency and the duration of the disease was over one year in most of the patients(88.5%). As the location, 49.4% occurred in the major salivary glands and 40.0% in the minor. The parotid gland was the most frequent site with 35.8% of the total, and the next were palate (18.9%), submaxillary gland(11.6%) and nasal cavity and maxillary sinus(10.6%). The tumors were benign in 57.9% and malignant in 42.1%. The most frequent histological type was benign mixed tumors (57.9%) and the next were adenoid cystic carcinoma (21.6%) and mucoepidermoid carcinomas(9.5%). Most of mixed tumors in the minor salivary glands occurred in the palate and all of thens were benign in character. Adenoid cystic carcinoma was most frequent in the basal cavity and maxillary sinus and the next was in the tongue. It seems that both the epithlial and myoepithelial cells take part in the formation of the mixed tumor favoring the opinion of Yates and Paget(1952), Azzopardi and Smith(1959) and Hubner et al. (1971).